Here, Kardec publishes the German-tomb conversation of the Schwabenhaus Password. She entered NDE days before she disincarnated. The article opens the field to, once again, talk about the phenomenon of ecstasy It's from sleep-walking, the former being a special class of the latter.

O ecstasy it is the state in which the independence of the soul, in relation to the body, manifests itself most sensitively and becomes, in a certain way, palpable.

At the dream and not sleep-walking, the soul wanders through earthly regions. In ecstasy, he penetrates an unknown world, that of ethereal Spirits, with whom he enters into communication […].

In the state of ecstasy, the annihilation of the body is almost complete. All that remains, one might say, is organic life. One feels that the soul is attached to it only by a thread, that one more tiny effort would break without remission.

Kardec, The Spirits' Book

“Many ecstatics are pawns of their own imagination and of mocking spirits who take advantage of the exaltation their. There are very few who deserve complete trust.”

The Mediums' Book, Kardec

444. What confidence can be placed in the revelations of ecstatics?

“The ecstatic is liable to be deceived very often, especially when he tries to penetrate what must remain a mystery to man, because then he lets himself be carried away by the current of his own ideas, or becomes the plaything of mystifying spirits, who take advantage of your enthusiasm to fascinate you.”

The Spirits' Book, Kardec

Briefly: Mrs. Schwabenhaus entered state cataleptic (or lethargic) and was judged dead. Then the funeral took place, while, in fact, she was in state of ecstasy and he glimpsed a whole consoling spiritual truth, together with his daughter, who died at the age of 7. it was you granted the gift of returning and saying goodbye to his loved ones, which he attended with extreme happiness. Shortly after, he definitively disincarnated. At the time, there was no knowledge about these states of the body.

At lethargy, the vital forces are dissipated and the body acquires the appearance of death, in a deep sleep. At catalepsy, this suspension of vital forces is sometimes localized. You lethargic and cataleptics they usually observe what is happening around them. The soul is aware of itself, but cannot communicate. It would be a near death.

Kardec evokes her on April 27, 1858 and clarifies some doubts, reinforcing the thesis of her ecstasy and other interesting points, in doctrinal agreement:

3. During your apparent death, did you hear what was happening around you and did you see the funeral apparatus? ─ My soul was very concerned about your coming happiness.

OBSERVATION: It is known that in general the lethargic see and hear what is going on around them and when waking up retain the memory. The fact that we portray offers the particularity of being lethargic sleep accompanied by ecstasy, which explains the diversion of the patient's attention.

5. ─ Can you tell us the difference between natural sleep and lethargic sleep? ─ Natural sleep is the rest of the body; the lethargic is the exaltation of the soul.

7. ─ How did your return to life take place?  ─ God allowed me to return to comfort the afflicted hearts around me.

8. ─ We would like a more material explanation.  ─ What you call perispirit still animated my earthly envelope.

OBSERVATION: It means to say that while the life of the body remains, the perispirit is connected to the cells. In OLE, we will see: 155. How does the separation of soul and body work? “The ties that held her are broken, she breaks free.” (it is the death of the body that causes the “exit” of the Spirit): a) – Does the separation occur instantly by a sudden transition? Is there a sharply drawn line of demarcation between life and death? "No; the soul gradually detaches, it does not escape like a captive bird that is suddenly restored to freedom. Those two states touch and confuse each other, so that the Spirit gradually breaks free from the bonds that bound it. These bonds are untied, not broken.”

Kardec comments on Ms. S., when he says that his daughter would be a pure Spirit. Of course it should be higher, but pure, here is relative.

In question 16, Kardec continues investigating the form by which spirits see each other. It is interesting how the response of a higher Spirit matches the response of the Spirit quoted in the article “The Drum of Beresina”, July 1858. Let us see Mrs. S.:

16. ─ Did you recognize her [the daughter] in any form? ─ I only saw her as Spirit.

In the article by Tambor de Beresina:

29. ─ How do you know that they are Spirits [the others you see]? ─ Among us, we see ourselves as we are.

32. ─ And do you see the other spirits with the forms they had in life? ─ No. We don't take on an appearance until we are evoked. Other than that, we are formless.

Question 31 (in the present article):

31. Since you have been here with the form you had on Earth, is it through the eyes that you see us? ─ No, the Spirit has no eyes. I only find myself in my last form to satisfy the laws that govern spirits when evoked and forced to resume what you call perispirit..

RE September /1858, Kardec

This affirmation of the evoked Spirit is one of the conclusions that Kardec reaches regarding the form of the Spirits:

88. Do spirits have a determined, limited and constant form?

“Not for you; for us, yes. The Spirit is, if you like, a flame, a flash, or an ethereal spark.”

a) – Does this flame or spark have color?

“It has a coloring that, for you, goes from a dark and opaque color to a brilliant color, like that of ruby, depending on whether the Spirit is more or less pure.”

Geniuses are usually represented with a flame or star on their foreheads. It is an allegory, which recalls the essential nature of Spirits. They place it on top of the head, because that is the seat of intelligence.

Book of Spirits, Kardec

Another cause of interest at the time, although it took place in 1572. O Saint Bartholomew's Night Massacreu or the night of Saint Bartholomew, was an episode, in the history of France, in the repression of Protestantism, engendered by the French kings, who were Catholics. These murders took place on August 23 and 24, 1572, in Paris, on St. Bartholomew's Day.[1] It is estimated that between 5,000 and 30,000 people were killed, depending on the attributed source.

Eight days after the São Bartolomeu Massacre, terrifying screams and groans were heard “in the air” by countless witnesses. The noise lasted about half an hour, then stopped. Himself King Charles IX he must have heard, for he looked somber, pensive, and wild.

Kardec brings the report only to demonstrate the similarity with the case of Mademoiselle Clairon (Feb/58) ee to demonstrate, once again, that the spiritist facts have always been in our history.

In this picture, which, if written in the Brazilian context, would probably be called “spiritist stories”, Kardec cites the cause reported by Patrie, on August 15, 1858:

an officer of French Directory(Name given to the Government of France), while traveling, he stayed in a hovel. During his sleep, he saw a terrible apparition: a “specter” that came out of the shadows, hair red with blood, throat cut, etc., came to him and gave him details of his own murder, indicating the place where his body was buried and the perpetrators of the crime. It evoked the officer's help to call the police and solve the case.

The officer did not listen, as he considered it to be his imagination. The next day, as he fell asleep, he had the vision of the Spirit again, this time more sad and threatening. He has ignored it again, the next day he saw the Spirit again, in sleep, now even more irritated and threatening. The officer thought it best not to ignore this time: he returned to the indicated place, called the officers and solved the case. This shows that this Spirit was very attached to material concepts, still, and that it had many imperfections, as it sought revenge.

Another apparition, this time with the contentment of the Spirit, more “kind” and affable. He said he would show himself again two hours before the officer's death, which he did years later.

Like all teaching, it is progressive. As humanity evolves its understanding changes. This article on Plato and Socrates is about that.

Remember the teachings of Last week's Sao Vicente de Paul? So, Saint Vincent de Paul spoke of the Gospel, that we should study it. Now, RE shows us something before Jesus, from the 5th and 4th century BC, from Plato and your mentor Socrates (remembering that it was Plato who wrote).

In the Spiritist Society, they had never imagined before:

“Today we will not discuss this theory, which was so far from our thinking when the Spirits revealed it to us, which surprised us strangely, because — we humbly confess — what Plato had written on this special subject was then completely unknown to us, new evidence, among others. so many others, that the communications given to us absolutely do not reflect our personal opinion. As for Plato's, we have only established the main idea, it being easy for each one to decide the form in which it is presented and to judge the points of contact that, in certain details, it may have with our current theory.

Kardec, Allan. Spiritist Magazine: first year: September/1858

The teachings of Socrates and Plato really carry the precepts of Jesus and are similar to those of the communicating spirits of Kardec's century.

In this article, RE presents as main ideas coming from Plato: the immortality of the soul, the succession of existences, the choice of existences as a result of free will, in short, the happy and unhappy consequences. Of course, Socrates, described by Plato, used parables to explain, because that was how they understood the lessons at that time. 

In his allegory of the Spindle of Necessity, Plato imagines a dialogue between Socrates and Glaucon, attributing to the former the speech of the RE, about the revelations of the Armenian Er, a fictional character, in all probability, although some take him for Zoroaster. worth reading.

Kardec presents the essence of an allegory by Plato, where a man would have had an NDE and came back telling “the other side”. It is very figurative, and it shows the idea of the Trial Choices before we reincarnate.

In these teachings, when Plato quotes the Daughters of Necessity, he is talking about divine laws. See what he says:

Passenger souls, you will start a new career and be reborn (reincarnate) in the mortal condition. Genius will not be pointed out to you; you will choose it yourself. You will choose the one that luck calls first, and that choice will be irrevocable. Virtue belongs to no one: it allies itself to those who dignify it and abandons those who despise it. Each one is responsible for the choice he makes, God is innocent.'

Kardec, RE September/1858

Then he goes on to describe how the rebirth takes place, which is very similar to what the Spirits in Kardec's times explain.

Therefore, each one is responsible for the choice! God is innocent in his free will!

In OLE, these issues are addressed in depth, as in  Part Two — On the Spiritist World or World of Spirits, Chapter VI — On the Spiritist Life, Choice of Evidence, as well as the questions 337 and 975. 

This RE article is Kardec's seed for the elaboration of the Gospel According to Spiritism (April 1864). in your introduction exposes the relationship with the ideas of Christianity and soon after the morals of Socrates and Plato.

Note: we also indicate this great video about the Morals of Socrates and Plato of the channel Spiritism for All

Today and then, many disdain mentions of dwellings on other planets, such as Jupiter. We may have scorned the descriptions of tables running around the room before. Honestly, it is only when we refer to Science that we cannot deny what is presented in a clear, lucid and rational way.

This article is one of the letters received from Victorien Sardou regarding Jupiter.

"If here, in likelihood of explanations, the reader does not find sufficient proof of their veracity; if, like us, you are not surprised by the perfect agreement between these revelations of the Spirits and the most positives of Astronomy; If, in a word, you see nothing more than a skillful mystification in the details that follow and in the drawing that accompanies them, I invite you to explain yourself to the Spirits, of whom I am only a faithful echo and instrument”.

The author invites critics to evoke the Spirits themselves and discuss with them.

Sardou follows the article by giving some descriptions about the dwellings and inhabitants of Jupiter. According to him - and whose source of information is, of course, the Spirits - the bodily conformation of these beings would be like that of a vapor, although much more subtle than that, intangible and luminous, especially in the contours of the face and head, "for there intelligence and life radiate like a very burning focus”.

It is from this vision, says Sardou, that Christian visionaries would have drawn the images of the halos of the saints.

According to him, the Spirits on this planet are incarnated in such subtle matter that they move very quickly and easily detach themselves from the planetary attraction (gravity), according to the action of their own will.

“Thus, some characters that Palissy chose to make me draw are represented as skimming the ground or on the surface of the water or still very high in the air, with all the freedom of action and movement that we attribute to the angels. This locomotion is all the easier the more purified the Spirit is., which is easily understood. Thus, nothing is easier for the inhabitants of the planet than to determine, at first glance, the value of a passing Spirit. Two signs betray him: the height of his flight and the more or less brilliant light of his halo.“

Sardou says that the less advanced Spirits of this planet, when evoked, respond in a laconic way and with a certain haste, as if they had a lot to do: they still don't have the power to radiate themselves simultaneously on two points.

Regarding animals, he says that not even the inhabitants of Jupiter present consensus about their Spirits: if they are Spirits apart or if they are Spirits that will one day reach humanity... It seems to be an enigma for spheres. above of Jupiter. 

Be that as it may, he points out that these Spirits came from other inferior planets, where they spent multiple incarnations, passing through a scale of improvement.

On Jupiter, animals are the only working beings, working on construction and even planting and harvesting. They are not sacrificed, because we already know that everyone there is vegetarian.

From then on, Sardou – or, rather, the communicating Spirit – continues weaving a series of descriptions incredible about the city of Julnius, about how it was formed, etc. He says that there are material parts of cities, on the ground, and diaphanous and flying parts, moved by will, which serve as shelter for human beings on this planet.

Sardou writes that Jupiter, according to the Spirits, has a day and a night, both lasting five hours. Today's data points out that, in fact, they are just over nine hours each.

It is on the right bank of that river, “whose water, says the Spirit, would give you the impression of the consistency of a very light vapor” [we know, today, that there are true rivers of ammonia, from the highest to the most low atmospheres], that the house of Mozart is built, whose design Palissy was kind enough to have me reproduce on copper.

Finally, the article is of general interest. Kardec emphasizes Sardou's honesty and seriousness, noting that Spiritism “does not recruit among fools and ignorant people”.

Kardec takes up the subject of the engravings, reproduced by the medium Victorien Sardou, who, according to Kardec, does not know how to draw or record, about Jupiter's dwellings.

"Even assuming that this drawing is a fantasy of the Spirit that traced it, the mere fact of its execution would not be a phenomenon less worthy of attention. […] not to satisfy the curiosity of frivolous people, but as a subject of study for serious people who want to delve into all the mysteries of Spirit Science” – As far as is known, only through Sardou were these drawings obtained.

It would be a mistake to think that we make the revelation of unknown worlds the main object of the doctrine. This will never be for us more than one accessory, which we consider useful as a complementary study; the main thing will always be for us the moral teaching and communications from beyond the grave we will seek above all that which can enlighten Humanity and lead it to the good, the only way to assure you of happiness in this world and in the next.

ardec presents a case that happened around December 1761, in the city of Dibbelsdorf – Germany, whose documents were published in 1811. The original article, written by Dr. Kerner, was translated into French by Alfred Pireaux.

It is another article of interest about the spiritist facts, which have always occurred everywhere and at all times. However, science was not yet ready to seriously analyze them, even less in the case of Germany at that time. 

Despite the fact that the facts – clever knocks on a corner of the Kettelhuts' house – were analyzed from all possible aspects, reaching the point of demolishing walls and a deep hole, in addition to confining all the residents to their houses and placing in observation the suspects, nothing was found. The only possible answer was never accepted, and they ended up prosecuting and condemning, under a coercive confession, the Kettelhuts.

We highlight Kardec's observation, always surgical in his words:

OBSERVATION: If we pay attention to the date when these things took place and compare them with what is happening in our day, we will find in them perfect identity in the manner of manifestation and even in the nature of the questions and answers. Neither America nor our time discovered the scouting spirits, as they did not discover the others, as we will demonstrate by countless authentic and more or less ancient facts.

KARDEC, RE Aug/1858

There is, however, between current phenomena and those of the past, a major difference: the latter were almost all spontaneous, while ours are produced almost at the will of certain special mediums. This circumstance allowed them to be better studied and their cause more in-depth. To the judges’ conclusion that “perhaps the future will enlighten us in this regard”, today the author would not answer: “the future has not taught us anything yet.” If this author were still alive, he would know, on the contrary, that the future taught everything and that the justice of our days, more enlightened than a century ago, would not commit, in relation to spiritist manifestations, mistakes that remind those of the Middle Ages. Our own sages have penetrated far enough into the mysteries of Nature not to play with unknown causes. They are shrewd enough and do not expose themselves, like their predecessors, to a denial of posterity, to the detriment of their reputation. If something appears on the horizon, they don't run to proclaim, "This is nothing", for fear it might be a ship. If they don't see it, they shut up and wait. This is true wisdom.

In this article, São Vicente de Paulo brings a great reflection on the charity.

Let us analyze, in addition to the necessary moral application that this text brings, its form and content, since it is a communication attributed to this Spirit. What is in these but spiritual elevation? 

“See the multitude of good men, whose pious memory your history recalls. I could cite thousands of those whose morals were aimed only at improving your globe. Has not Christ told you everything concerning the virtues of charity and love? Why are your divine teachings set aside? Why are the ears closed to his divine words and the heart closed to all his soft maxims?

I would like the reading of the Gospel to be done with more personal interest. But they abandon that book; they transform it into an empty expression and a dead letter; leave this admirable code to oblivion. Your evils come from the voluntary abandonment in which you leave this summary of divine laws. Read, then, these fiery pages of Jesus' devotion and meditate on them. I myself feel ashamed to dare to promise you a work on charity, when I think that in this book you will find all the teachings that should lead you to the heavenly regions..”

Charity, in Kardec's context, was understood differently:

[…] rational morality is based on psychology and the definition of an active human being. That is, the moral act is characterized by a free and conscious act, which is defined as the act of duty. It is the morality of freedom, therefore absolutely free, by definition, from any reward or punishment. In this way, as defined by the thinkers of Rational Spiritualism, duty grounds charity as free and disinterested action. The beauty of charity lies precisely in its freedom, said Victor Cousin, the main leader of this school at the Sorbonne University in Paris. (Figueiredo 2019)

Does this mean that we only need the Gospel?

Assuming the Gospel of Jesus very well understood, without sophistry and adulteration, yes, we only need it. However, it is necessary to take into account that its teachings, even if scientific, have a moral aspect, according to the Moral Sciences. Therefore, it is a mistake to abandon this study to fall only in the Evangelical study, given the present needs of Spirits of our category.

Continuing in the article about Charity, according to São Vicente: “Strong men, arm yourselves; weak men, forge your weapons of your sweetness and your faith; have more persuasion, more constancy in the propagation of your new doctrine. We only come to bring you an encouragement; it is only to stimulate the zeal and virtues that God allows us to manifest to you. But if you wished, you would need only the help of God and your own will.. “

Does that mean that we don't need Spiritism?

Morally speaking, if we knew how to apply all the lessons presented so far, we wouldn't even be talking about it now. But that's not how spiritual progress happens – in jolts. It is slow and gradual and, as far as we know, it is everywhere in the Universe. Therefore, the Spiritist Science, which, in the limit, is the science of Creation, is a necessary part of our progress, as knowledge develops morality.

Let's look a little more critically at the content of this message. The following passage caught our attention:

“When you allow your heart to open to the supplication of the first unfortunate person who reaches out to you; when you give it to him without asking whether his misery is feigned or whether his illness has a vice as its cause; when you leave all righteousness in God's hands; when you leave to the Creator the punishment of all false miseries; finally, when you practice charity for the sole pleasure that it provides, without questioning its usefulness, then you will be the children that God will love and that he will call to himself.“

This Spirit, who goes on saying to congratulate himself on the beginning of a movement (São Vicente de Paulo Society), a very important and necessary movement, suggests that we must respond to any request, without verifying whether it is something faked or not. In reality, can we and should we do this, especially nowadays?

We must not blindly follow any Spirit, especially when it makes no sense to our own reason. But Kardec comes to our rescue:

Continuing the conversation with S. Vicente de Paulo, through the psychography of an assistant medium, Kardec informs himself that, in this previous passage, this Spirit speaks specifically of alms. The teacher then asks:

“[…] it seems to us that giving without discernment to those who do not need it or who could earn a living by honest work is to encourage vice and laziness. If lazy people found someone else's purse easily open, they would multiply to infinity, to the detriment of the truly needy.”

SVP responds:

"You can identify those who can work and then charity obliges you to do everything to provide them with work. However, there are also poor liars, who know very well how to simulate miseries that they do not suffer. These are the ones to be left to the righteousness of God.”

Kardec continues with some questions of interest:

6. – Jesus said: “May your right hand not know what your left hand is doing.” Do those who give out of ostentation have any merit? ─ They only have the merit of pride, for which they will be punished.

7. Doesn't Christian charity, in its broadest sense, also include sweetness, benevolence and indulgence towards the weaknesses of others? ─ Do like Jesus. He told you all this. I listened to him more than ever.

8. ─ Is charity properly understood when it is exclusive among creatures of the same opinion or of the same party? ─ No. It is above all the spirit of sect and party that must be abolished, since all men are brothers. That's what we focus our efforts on.

9. ─ Let us admit that a person sees two men in danger, but cannot save but one. One is your friend and the other your enemy. Whom should you save? ─ You must save your friend, because that friend could accuse you of not being friends with you. As for the other, God will take care of it.

It was a consensus that this last question (9.) seemed strange to us, but it must have a reason for being at that moment.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NVwXDL3HdA

Allan Kardec starts the Magazine of the month of May 1858 bringing to light a reflection on the Manifestations Physics of the Spirits, which, for many, is somethingsupernatural” and even impossible.

This is due to the fact that we think that the Spirit is an abstraction. Says Kardec: Asked if they are immaterial, the Spirits replied: “Immaterial is not the right term, because the Spirit is something; otherwise it would be nothing. It is material, if you like, but of a matter so ethereal that for you it is as if it did not exist”. 

Thus, the Spirit is not an abstraction, as some think; it is a being, but whose intimate nature escapes our gross senses.

According to observations, and not a system, the Spirit recently freed from the body keeps its physical characteristics of the immediate incarnation, involved, almost always, in a disturbance that follows for more or less time, depending on each one. After this period, the body becomes for them like an “old clothes”, which they no longer want.

Let us return, then, to the various accounts of tangible apparitions, as mentioned in the case of Mr Home, in the April issue. Kardec takes up this fact to conclude the following: that the soul does not leave everything in the coffin: it takes something with it.

There would, therefore, be, in us, two kinds of matter besides the Spirit: the gross matter, which constitutes the body, and a more subtle matter, which constitutes what Kardec called perispirit.

This subtle matter, as it were, extracted from all the parts of the body to which it was attached during life, retains its form. This is why all spirits are seen and why they appear to us as they were in life.

O perispirit, however, is not something rigid and compact like the body: it is an expandable and flexible matter, and that is not limited to the body, as in a shell: it expands around it, at the rate of centimeters or meters, and that is what gives origin of what many call the aura. In reality, the aura is like a field of energies of the solid body and not the perispirit.

Disentangling himself from this obstacle that was compressing him, the perispirit stretches or contracts; turns and, in a word, it lends itself to all metamorphoses, according to the will that acts upon it.

Observation proves - and we insist on the word observation, because our whole theory is a consequence of the facts studied - that the subtle matter, which constitutes the second envelope of the Spirit, only gradually detaches itself from the body, and not instantly.

The bonds that unite soul and body are not suddenly broken by death. Now, the state of disturbance that we observe lasts as long as the detachment takes place. Only when this detachment is complete does the Spirit recover the complete freedom of its faculties and the clear consciousness of itself..

Experience also proves that the duration of this detachment varies with individuals. In some it takes three or four days, while in others it is not completed until after several months. Thus, the destruction of the body and putrid decomposition are not enough for the separation to take place. This is the reason why certain spirits say: I feel the worms gnawing at me.

And we asked ourselves: Is there an explanation for the supposed Spiritual Hospitals? Watch the video with our discussion about it.

In some people, separation begins before death: they are those who, in life, were elevated by thought and by the purity of their feelings, above material things. In them death finds only weak bonds between soul and body, which are broken almost instantly. The more materially man lived; the more his thoughts have been absorbed in the pleasures and worries of the personality, the more tenacious are those bonds. 

It seems that subtle matter is identified with compact matter and that a molecular cohesion is established between them. This is why they only separate slowly and with difficulty.

the matter of perispirit is something subtle enough to escape our sight and pass through solid objects, but, according to the will of the Spirit, it can be condense enough, however momentarily, to become solid as rock. We have an example of this in Mr. Home of April, where hands are mentioned that came out of the middle of the table, but that became tangible. Bozzano also cites this in Spiritism and the Supernormal Manifestations.

THE an apparent, tangible hand offers resistance: it exerts pressure, leaves impressions, operates a traction on the objects we hold. There is, therefore, a force in it. Now, these facts, which are not hypotheses, can lead us to the explanation of physical manifestations.

Kardec continues, stating that these hands (or other bodily ones), when condensed, has sufficient strength, just as we would, he can also hit us, lift and knock down a table, touch a bell, pull a curtain and even give us an invisible slap.

Where could there be the capacity for such subtle matter to be capable of such material force?

But Kardec asserts: we don't want to test the Spirit with our laboratory instruments, especially after we've taken steam as a basis for comparison: It is a new order of ideas, outside the scope of the exact sciences. That is why these sciences do not offer us the special ability to appreciate them.

Kardec takes these comparisons just to be able to show others that the facts of physical manifestations are not something so inconceivable, nor so far from what we already know (or knew at that time).

At the Book of Spirits, there is an explanation about:

257. The body is the instrument of pain. If it is not the primary cause of this, it is at least the immediate cause. The soul has the perception of pain: this perception is the effect. The memory that the soul retains of pain can be very painful, but it cannot have physical action. In fact, neither cold nor heat is capable of disorganizing the tissues of the soul, which is not susceptible to freezing or burning. Do we not see every day the memory or apprehension of a physical illness producing the effect of that illness, as if it were real? Do we not see them until they cause death? Everyone knows that those who have had a limb amputated often feel pain in the missing limb. Of course, there is not the thirst, or even the starting point of pain. The only thing is that the brain has kept this impression. It will therefore be lawful to admit that something analogous occurs in the sufferings of the Spirit after death. An in-depth study of the perispirit, which plays such an important role in all spiritist phenomena; in vaporous or tangible apparitions; in the state in which the Spirit finds itself at death; in the idea, which he so often manifests, that he is still alive; in the very moving situations of the suicides, the tortured, those who let themselves be absorbed by material pleasures; and countless other facts, shed light on this question, giving rise to explanations that we now summarize. 

The perispirit is the bond that unites the Spirit to the matter of the body; it is taken from the environment, from the universal fluid. It participates at the same time in electricity, in the magnetic fluid and, to a certain extent, in inert matter. One could say that it is the quintessence of matter. It is the principle of organic life, but not of intellectual life, which resides in the Spirit. It is, moreover, the agent of external sensations. In the body, the organs, serving as conduits, locate these sensations. When the body is destroyed, they become general. Hence the Spirit does not say that it suffers more from the head than from the feet, or vice versa. However, do not confuse the sensations of the perispirit, which has become independent, with those of the body. The latter can only be taken as a term of comparison and not by identity. Freed from the body, spirits can suffer, but this suffering is not corporeal, although it is not exclusively moral, like remorse, since they complain of cold and heat. Nor do they suffer more in winter than in summer: we have seen them go through flames without experiencing any pain. Consequently, the temperature does not make any impression on them. The pain they feel is not, therefore, a physical pain properly speaking: it is a vague intimate feeling, which the Spirit itself does not always understand well, precisely because the pain is not located and because external agents do not produce it; it is more reminiscence than reality, reminiscence but equally painful. Sometimes, however, there is more to it than that, as we shall see.

Experience teaches us that, at death, the perispirit detaches more or less slowly from the body; that, during the first minutes after disincarnation, the Spirit finds no explanation for the situation in which it finds itself. He believes he is not dead, because he feels alive; he sees the body to one side, he knows that it belongs to him, but he does not understand that he is separated from it. This situation lasts as long as there is any connection between the body and the perispirit. A suicidal man once told us, "No, I'm not dead." And he added: However, I feel the worms gnawing at me. Now, undoubtedly, the worms did not gnaw at his perispirit and even less at the Spirit; they only gnawed at his body. As, however, the separation of the body and the perispirit was not complete, a kind of moral repercussion was produced, transmitting to the Spirit what was happening in the body. Repercussion is perhaps not the proper term, because it can lead to the assumption of a very material effect. It was rather the vision of what was happening to the body, to which the perispirit still kept it connected, which caused him the illusion, which he took for reality. So, then, there would be no reminiscence in the case, since he had not been gnawed by worms in life: there was the feeling of a fact of the present. This shows what deductions can be drawn from the facts, when carefully observed. During life, the body receives external impressions and transmits them to the Spirit through the perispirit, which probably constitutes what is called nervous fluid. Once dead, the body feels nothing, because there is no Spirit or perispirit in it. The latter, detached from the body, experiences the sensation, however, as it no longer reaches him through a limited channel, it becomes general to him. Now, since the perispirit is not really more than a simple agent of transmission, since the consciousness is in the Spirit, it is logical to deduce that, if a perispirit could exist without a Spirit, that one would feel nothing, exactly like a body that he died. Likewise, if the Spirit did not have a perispirit, it would be inaccessible to any painful sensation. This is what happens with completely purified spirits. We know that the more they purify themselves, the more ethereal the essence of the perispirit becomes, whence it follows that the material influence decreases as the Spirit progresses, that is, as the perispirit itself becomes less coarse.

But, it will be said, since it is through the perispirit that pleasant sensations, as well as unpleasant ones, are transmitted to the Spirit, since the pure Spirit is inaccessible to some, it must be equally inaccessible to others. So it is, in fact, with regard to those that come solely from the influence of matter that we know. The sound of our instruments, the perfume of our flowers make no impression on you. However, he experiences intimate sensations, of an indefinable charm, of which we can form no idea, because in this respect we are like born blind before the light. We know this is real; but by what means is it produced? This point eludes knowledge. We know that in the Spirit there is perception, feeling, hearing, seeing; that these faculties are attributes of the whole being and not, as in man, of a part of the being alone; but how does he have them? We ignore it. The spirits themselves cannot inform us about this, because our language is inadequate to express ideas that we do not have, precisely as the savages, for lack of proper terms, are used to translate ideas referring to our arts, sciences and philosophical doctrines.

In saying that spirits are inaccessible to the impressions of matter that we know, we are referring to very high spirits, whose ethereal envelope finds no analogy in this world. The same is not true of those with a denser perispirit, who perceive our sounds and odors, not, however, only through a limited part of their individualities, as happened to them when they were alive. It can be said that, in them, the molecular vibrations are felt throughout the being and thus reach the sensorium commune, which is the Spirit itself, although in a different way and perhaps also giving a different impression, which modifies the perception. They hear the sound of our voice, yet they understand us without the aid of the word, only through the transmission of thought. In support of what we say is the fact that this penetration is so much easier, the more dematerialized the Spirit is. As far as sight is concerned, this, for the Spirit, is independent of the light, which we have. The faculty of seeing is an essential attribute of the soul, for whom obscurity does not exist. It is, however, more extensive, more penetrating in the most purified. The soul, or the Spirit, therefore, has in itself the faculty of all perceptions. These, in bodily life, are obliterated by the grossness of the bodily organs; in out-of-body life, they unwind, as the semi-material envelope becomes ethereal.

Hauled from the environment, this wrap varies according to the nature of the worlds. When passing from one world to another, the spirits change their envelope, as we change clothes, when we pass from winter to summer, or from the pole to the equator. When they come to visit us, the higher ones take on the terrestrial perispirit and then their perceptions are produced as in the common spirits of our world. All, however, inferior as well as superior, do not hear or feel, but what they want to hear or feel. Having no sense organs, they can freely make their perceptions active or null. They are obliged to listen to only one thing: the advice of good spirits. The view, this is always active; but, they can make themselves invisible to each other. Depending on the category they occupy, they can hide from those who are inferior to them, but not from those who are superior to them. In the first moments that follow death, the vision of the Spirit is always troubled and confused. It clarifies as it comes off, and can achieve the clarity it had during earthly life, regardless of the possibility of penetrating through bodies that are opaque to us. As for its extension through indefinite space, future and past, it depends on the degree of purity and elevation of the Spirit.

They will perhaps object: “This whole theory is not at all reassuring. We thought that, once we were freed from our gross envelope, instrument of our pains, we would no longer suffer, and here we are informed that we will still suffer. One way or another, it will always be suffering.” Yea! it may happen that we continue to suffer, and a lot, and for a long time, but also that we stop suffering, even from the moment that our bodily life ends.

The sufferings of this world are sometimes independent of us; many, however, are due to our will. Trace each one back to their origin and you will see that most of such sufferings are the effects of causes which it would have been possible for you to avoid. How many evils, how many infirmities does man owe to his excesses, to his ambition, in a word: to his passions? He who always lived soberly, who abused nothing, who was always simple in tastes and modest in desires, would be covered for many tribulations. The same is true of the Spirit. The sufferings you go through are always the consequence of the way you lived on Earth. Sure, you will no longer suffer from gout or rheumatism; however, he will experience other sufferings that have nothing to do with them. We have seen that his suffering results from the bonds that still tie him to matter; that the more free you are from its influence, or, on the other hand, the more dematerialized you are, the less painful sensations you will experience. Now, it is in your hands to free yourself from such influence from the present life. He has free will, he has, therefore, the faculty of choosing between doing and not doing. Tame your animal passions; do not harbor hatred, nor envy, nor jealousy, nor pride; do not allow yourself to be dominated by selfishness; purify yourself, nourishing good feelings; do good; do not attach importance to the things of this world that they do not deserve; and then, although coated with the body wrap, it will already be purified, it will already be freed from the yoke of matter and, when it leaves this wrapping, it will no longer be influenced by it. No painful memory will come to him of the physical sufferings he has suffered; they will leave no unpleasant impression, because they will only have hit the body and not the Spirit. He will be happy to have freed himself from them, and the peace of his conscience will free him from any moral suffering. We questioned, by the thousands, Spirits who on Earth belonged to all classes of society, occupied all social positions; we study them in all periods of the spiritist life, from the moment they left the body; We followed them step by step in the life beyond the grave, to observe the changes that took place in them, in their ideas, in their sensations and, in this respect, it was not those who were here counted among the most common men who provided less precious elements of study. Now, we always notice that the sufferings were related to the course they had and whose consequences they experienced; that the afterlife is a source of ineffable happiness for those who have followed the good path. It follows that, to those who suffer, it happens because they wanted to; who, therefore, must complain of themselves alone, whether in the other world or in this.

There is, however, another [theory], of high philosophical scope, given by the Spirits themselves, which sheds an entirely new light on this problem. It will be better understood after you have read it. In fact, it is useful to know all the systems in order to be able to compare them.

It remains now to explain how this modification of the ethereal substance of the perispirit; by what process does the Spirit operate and, consequently, the role of mediums of physical influence in the production of these phenomena; what in such circumstances happens to them; the cause and nature of his faculties, &c.

That's what we'll do in the next article.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WR8ZR94D9lA&t=4207s

Mehmet-Ali, or Mohammed Ali, 1769 to 1849, was Viceroy of Egypt from 1805 to 1848, as Governor of the Ottoman Empire on behalf of the Sultan.

Considered as the founder of modern Egypt, he introduced major reforms in the country, among them: the construction of irrigation canals to better distribute the waters of the Nile River, construction of buildings, institution of new laws, taxes, modernization of the army, etc. It achieved considerable autonomy from the Ottoman Empire and also considerably extended its borders. More on Mehmet-Ali's life Click here.

Pasha Mehmet-Ali had died about 10 years before this evocation, at the request of Kardec and his colleagues. He said he had come to instruct them. They asked for proofs that he was really the disembodied Spirit of Pachá, in which he replied saying that the Spirit reveals itself by his words, always.

He said he was close to the medium Ermance Dufaux. Ele se “acomodou” em uma cadeira vazia. Ninguém o via.

The Pasha said that he was unhappy (he used the term that he was disgraced), that he was in the condition of a wanderer, that he did not clearly remember his former existence as Mehmet-Ali…

10. ─ Do you remember what you were in the existence before this one?

─ I was poor on Earth. I envied earthly grandeurs and went up to suffer.

11. ─ If you can be reborn on Earth, which condition will you prefer?

─ The obscure: the duties are smaller.

12. ─ What do you think now of the position you have occupied lately on Earth?

─ Pure vanity! I wanted to lead the men. Did I know how to lead myself?

14. Public opinion appreciates what you have done for the civilization of Egypt and that is why it places you among the great princes. Are you satisfied with that?

─ What do I care? The opinion of men is the desert wind that lifts the dust

15. ─ Do you see your descendants with pleasure following the same path? Do your efforts interest you?

─ Yes, because they aim at the common good.

16. – However, you are accused of acts of great cruelty. Do you regret them now?

─ I atone for them.

17. ─ Do you see those whom you ordered to be massacred?

─ Yes.

18. ─ How do they feel about you?

─ Hatred and pity.

Spiritist Magazine April/1858

The Spirit continues to give its opinions regarding the Muslim and Christian religions. In the view of this Spirit, the first was still very materialistic, while the second was higher. He even says that he considered that Mohammed distorted his mission, because he wanted to reign.

In Mehmet-ali's opinion, polygamy was one of the ties that still hold people back in barbarism; he also says that he understands that the slavery of women was not justifiable; he says that slavery only brutalizes man; 

He says that the Spiritist Doctrine was the Doctrine of the priests of ancient Egypt, that they received manifestations, had the same source as those received by Moses, as they were initiated by them. He went on to say that Moses wanted to reveal, while the Egyptian Priests only wanted to hide them. Still talking about religions, he added that all mother religions are linked together by almost invisible ties. They come from the same source, being sisters.

This Spirit had memories of other very distant existences, claiming to have lived in the time of the pharaohs three times: as a priest (at the time of Sesostris, according to his memory), as a beggar and as a prince, the first being approximately 1900 years before Christ. He had said he had progressed slowly.

48. Is it because you were a priest in those times that you were able to speak to us with knowledge of the ancient religion of the Egyptians?

─ Yes, but I'm not perfect enough to know everything. Others read the past like an open book.

Spiritist Magazine April/1858

And so, apparently, Pachá dodges Kardec's last questions, one about the reason for the construction of the pyramids and another that is not mentioned.

This evocation expresses a lot the sorrow of the Spirit who made an incarnation not very fruitful for his moral elevation.